UPA dividing people on basis of minority, majority: Advani

Gandhinagar, Feb 20 (IANS) Criticising the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government for “dividing people on the basis of minority and majority communities”, Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) senior leader L.K. Advani said here Friday that the UPA was using caste and religion for nursing its vote banks. Launching the BJP’s poll campaign from the constituency of Gandhinagar, from where he has won four times, Advani said though the constitution does not talk about dividing people on the basis of minority or majority, the UPA government at the centre “is doing just that”.

Addressing a public meeting Friday evening, Advani said the first right on the country’s resources ought to be with the poor and the backward. “It should not be a right for any religious group,” he added.

Terming the Modi government as pro-poor and pro-farmer, Advani said the “BJP philosophy is to see that in the progress of the country all sections of the society are carried along without any discrimination”.

“The centre led by the UPA has been using caste and religion for nursing its votebanks. We want all strata of society to benefit. We want to see water in each farmland, eradication of unemployment and the common labourer getting his due.”

Earlier, he also inaugurated a school for the Thakors here.

In the morning, he inaugurated a fitness and health centre in Vadaj developed by the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation that also has a swimming pool and a gymnasium.

The 81-year-old Advani tried out some of the equipment at the health centre.

The Gandhinagar constituency may require a new poll strategy after the delimitation as two assembly segments, Kalol and Sanand, have been added to the Gandhinagar seat while two others, Ellisbridge and Gandhinagar-1, have been excluded.